Piers Anthony - Sos the Rope

Something had gone drastically wrong, and he could not believe that his own absence could account for it. Tor's tribe was hardly like this. What had taken the spirit out of Sol's drive for empire?

A woman came quietly to the tent. "Bracelet?" she inquired, her voice muffled, her face hidden in the dusk.

"No!" he snapped, turning his eyes from the hourglass figure that showed in provocative silhouette against the distant evening fires.

She tugged open the mesh and kneeled to show her face.

"Would you shame me, Sos?"

"I 'asked for no woman," he said, not looking at her.

"Go away. No offense."

She did not move. "Greensleeves," she murmured.

His head jerked up. "Sola!"

"It was never your habit to make me wait so long for recognition," she said with wry reproof. "Let me in before someone sees." She scrambled inside and refastened the mesh. "I changed places with the girl assigned, so I think we're safe. But still-"

"What are you doing here? I thought you weren't-"

She stripped and crawled into his bedroll. "You must have been exercising!"

"Not any more."

"Oh, but you have! I never felt such a muscular body."

"I mean we're not- lovers any more. If you won't meet me by day, I won't meet you by night."

"Why did you come, then?' she inquired, placing against him a body that had become magnificent. Her pregnancy of the year before had enhanced her physical attributes.

"I came to claim you honorably."

"Claim me, then! No man but you has touched me since we first met."

"Tomorrow. Give back his bracelet and take mine, publicly."

"I will," she said. "Now-"

"No!"

She drew back and tried to see his face in the dark. "You mean it."

"I love you. I came for you. But I will have you honorably."

She sighed. "Honor is not quite- that simple, Sos." But she got up and began putting on her clothing.

"What has happened here? Where is Sol? Why are you hiding from people?"

"You left us, Sos. That's what happened. You were the heart of us."

"That doesn't make sense. I had to leave. You were having the baby. His son."

"No."

"That was the price of you. I will not pay it again. This time it has to be my son, conceived upon my bracelet."

"You don't understand anything!" she cried in frustration.

He paused, knowing the mystery to be yet unfathomed. "Did it die?"

"No! That's not the point. That-oh, you stupid, stupid clubhead! You-" She choked over her own emotion -and faced away from him, sobbing.

She was more artful, too, than she had been, he thought. He did not yield. He let her run down, unmoving.

Finally she wiped her face and crawled out of the tent. He -was alone.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Sol was a little leaner, a little more serious, but retained the uncanny grace his coordination provided. "You came!" he exclaimed, grasping Sos's hand in an unusual display of pleasure.

"Yesterday," Sos said, somewhat embarrassed. "I saw Vit, but he wouldn't let me talk to your' wife, and I hardly know the others here." How much should he say?

"She should have come to you anyway. Vit knows nothing." He paused refiectively. "We do not get along. She keeps to herself."

So Sol still didn't care about Sola. He had protected her for the sake of the coming heir and no longer even bothered with pretense. But why, then, had he kept her isolated? It had never been Sol's way to be pointlessly selfish.

"I have a weapon now," Sos said. Then, as the other looked at him:"The rope."

"I am glad of it."

There did not seem to be much else to say. Their reunion, like their parting, was an awkward thing.

"Come," Sol said abruptly. "I will show her to you."

Sos followed him into the main tent, uncomfortably offbalance. He should have admitted that he had talked with Sola and prevented this spurious introduction. He had come on a matter of honor, yet he was making himself a liar.

Nothing was falling out quite the way he had expected- but the differences were intangible. The subtle wrongnesses were entangling him, as though he had fallen prey in the circle to the net.

They stopped before a homemade crib in a small compartment. Sol leaned down to pick up a chuckling baby "This is my daughter," he said. "Six months, this week."

Sos stood with one hand on- his rope, speechless gazing at the black-haired infant. A daughter! Somehow that possibility had never occurred to him.

"She will be as beautiful as her mother," Sol said proudly. "See her smile."

"Yes," Sos agreed, feeling every bit as stupid as Sola had called him. The name should not have gone to his bird.

"Come," Sol repeated. "We will take her for a walk." He hefted the baby upon his shoulder and led the way. Sos followed numbly, realizing that this was the female they had come to see, not the mother. If he had only known, or guessed, or allowed himself to hear, last night.

Sola met them at the entrance. "I would come," she said

Sol sounded annoyed. "Come, then, woman. We only walk."

The little party threaded its way out of the camp and into the nearby forest. It was like old times, when they had journeyed to the badlands yet completely different. What incredible things had grown from the early coincidence of names!

This was all wrong. He had come to claim the woman he loved, to challenge Sol for her in the circle if he had to yet he could not get the words out. He loved her and she loved him and her nominal husband admitted the marriage was futile-but Sos felt like a terrible intruder.

Stupid flew ahead, happy to sport among the forest shadows; or perhaps there were insects there.

This could not go on. "I came for Sola," he said baldly.

Sol did not even hesitate. "Take her." It was as though the woman were not present.

"My bracelet, on her- wrist," Sos said, wondering whether he had been understood. "My children by her. She shall be Sosa."

"Certainly."

This was beyond credence. "You have no conditions?"

"Only your friendship."

Sos spluttererd, "This is not a friendly matter!"

"Why not? I have preserved her only for you."

"You-Vit-?" This elaborate guardianship had been for his, Sos's benefit? "Why-?"

"I would have her take no lesser name," Sol said.

Why not, indeed? There seemed to be no barrier to an amicable changeover but it was wrong. It couldn't work. He could not put his finger on the flaw, but knew there was something.

"Give me Soli," Sola said.

Sol hanaed the baby over. She opened her dress and held Soli to her breast to nurse as they walked.

And that was it. The baby! "Can she leave her mother?" Sos asked.

"No," Sola replied.

"You will not take my daughter," Sol said, raising his voice for the first time.

"No-of course not. But until she is weaned-"

"Until, nothing," Sola- said firmly. "She's my daughter, too. She stays with me."

"Soli is mine!" Sol said with utter conviction. "You woman-stay or go as you will, wear whose clasp you will-but Soli is mine."

The baby looked up and began to cry. Sol reached over and took the little girl, and she fell contentedly silent. Sola made a face but said nothing.

"I make no claim upon your daughter," Sos said carefully. "But if she cannot leave her mother-"

Sal found a fallen tree and sat down upon it, balancing Soli upon his knee. "Sorrow fell upon our camp when you departed. Now you are back, and with your weapon. Govern my tribe, my empire, as you did before. I would have you by my side again."

"But I came to take Sola away with me! She cannot stay here after she exchanges bracelets. It would bring shame upon us both."

"Why?"

"Sosa nursing Sol's child?"

Sol thought about it. "Let her wear my bracelet, then. She will still be yours."

"You would wear the horns?"